“We are a modern letterpress printing studio working in an old paper mill
in North Wales, United Kingdom.”

Archive for the ‘Limited Edition Prints’ Category

We were thrilled to be working once again with Jock. This time he has teamed up with Vice Press to produce this awesome limited edition set of Judge Dredd letterpress prints.

The set consists of five 8″ x 8″ pieces with a sixth print randomly inserted in a limited amount of sets. Printed on 300gsm cotton paper and presented in a custom made folder.

The printing presses of choice for this job were our Heidelberg cylinders. These presses provide excellent ink coverage while keeping the ink consistent through the entire run. They ensure the very best letterpress prints possible and retain the finest details from Jock’s original drawings.

When Tommy Nagle first approached us about Film Directors #1 we threatened to “send evil pigeons with bad guts to fly over his house if he didn’t let us print this”. He agreed.

The detail of every single delicate beard hair (and glasses) on Tommy’s original artwork have transferred faithfully under the extreme pressure of the press. Featuring (from top left) Francis Ford Coppola, Tim Burton, John Landis, George Lucas, George A Romero, Steven Spielberg, Spike Lee, Peter Jackson and Hayao Miyazaki.

“I’m always making things and never quite finishing them, so I was happily shocked when Blush agreed to turn my idea into a tangible thing.” Explains Tommy. “I hadn’t really made anything like this before, aside from some etching experiments at art school, but I’d seen Blush’s work on various blogs and knew that if I were to ever make a ‘proper’ print, I’d want it to be letterpress, and I’d want Blush to print it.”

The prints are A3 (297 x 420mm) 300gsm Somerset cotton and are available to buy from Tommy’s shop. Profits go toward the Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research.

Fans of Spider-Man will love this cheeky play on the iconic masked hero and the man behind this superhero’s mask is illustrator Olly Moss.

We ran the prints simultaneously on two Heidelberg cylinders, first printing the red plate then then transferring the sheets onto the second press to print the black plate. Registration was surprisingly tight as there was no trapping between the red and black plates. Printing the black over the red helped to create a rich black.

We have collaborated with Ammo Magazine and illustrator Nick Deakin to produce this limited edition letterpress print. Nick’s bold line work makes a wonderful impression into Saunders 425gsm cotton, chosen for it’s weight and texture.

We converted Nick’s digital artwork to colour separations, outputted to film and made our photopolymer plates. The smallest detail in the illustration is transferred faithfully to the plates which are mounted on aluminum bases to type height and locked up in the chase. We printed each plate/colour simultaneously on 2 Heidelberg platens achieving accurate registration. Nick supplied Pantone colour refs and the inks were hand mixed to match.

The A5, 2 colour print is signed by the artist and comes with latest lumberjack themed magazine. The print is limited to 500 so be quick!

To celebrate the 2012 Olympics Found and Charlotte Trounce collaborated to create this Olympic themed limited edition calender. We letterpress printed the A3 calender on our Heidelberg cylinder press onto 300gsm Somerset cotton paper in 2 colours. The hand drawn illustrations and typography transfer faithfully to letterpress. The prints are available to buy on the Found online store.

The first in the ‘Assorted Types’ series of letterpress prints showcasing classic typefaces. Designed by Jim Williams, an award winning typographer & graphic designer who has a lifelong passion for the craft of typography and letterforms. He also has a keen interest and understanding of letterpress and teaches typography at Staffordshire University. Jim’s knowledge of typography and attention to detail is second to none. Constantly ‘tweaking’ his work until it is just perfect, kerning here, letterspacing there, a real perfectionist.

We were thrilled when Candykiller aka Brian Taylor called on Blush to produce his latest ‘Beast’ print. We have worked with Candykiller before, printing the 5th Anniversary limited edition prints. Candykiller’s illustrations print beautifully on the press and Brian’s attention to detail and technical ability when it comes to artwork is first class.

We printed the Beast on 300gsm cotton paper on a Heidelberg platen press, tweeting live at each stage of the production, from platemaking to trimming. The first stage of the job was to prepare Brian’s artwork for print. The artwork was supplied digitally and we check the file before creating the separations. Each colour is a separate pass through the press, so once through for the red and through again for the black. This means we would need two plates.

We mix the ink to a Pantone ref supplied by the artist and ink up the press. We decided to add the rider roller to give an even and consistent spread of ink across the image and to prevent ‘ghosting’.

The plate is attached to a base to bring it up to type height (.918″) and locked up in the chase then locked into the press.

We ink up the press and pull some initial prints to check for registration, ink coverage and impression. We also check the print for any defects in the plate.

Once we are happy with we run the sheets through the press.

After the first colour run we wash-up the press and prepare for the second colour. Change plates, ink up for black pass and reload the paper on the press.

We pull some prints and check once again for impression, ink coverage and registration.

Then run the sheets through and print the black plate.

The final prints are checked and trimmed on the guillotine before packing.

You can see more production shots on our Flickr pages and follow us on Twitter for news and updates on future live letterpress tweets.

We have been having a shift around in the print room and have found some bits and pieces we had forgotten about. Amongst some posters we found a print we had taken to proof a font of wood type we had acquired.

Letterpress printed on our Vandercook proofing press. The poster is 320 x 420mm light grey paper. Printed in black ink with beautiful wood type. The type is in good condition but has a few knocks which adds character.

We will be giving away a copy of the print to one of our Twitter followers today. Simply follow us and say ‘Hi!” and at the end of the day we’ll pick a random winner from our Twitter followers.

Gill McColl of Take the Proverbial came to blush°° to letterpress print these two quotes. The hand drawn typography transferred faithfully from digital artwork to photopolymer plate to tactile letterpress print.

We printed the posters on our Heidelberg KSBA cylinder. The impression strength of the cylinder ensured a consistent and deep print evenly into the cotton paper across the whole print area. The prints were printed on 300gsm Somerset 100% cotton paper. Spot colours were provided for each A4 print.

To mark England’s first game in this years World Cup we printed the greatest score in english football history. Hand set antique wood and metal type and printed on our Vandercook proofing press in black, red and blue. The old wood type creates a beautiful deep impression into the soft pure cotton paper.

Dimensions: 375 x 275mm
Somerset Soft White 100% cotton 300gsm

The prints are £15 each with free delivery and are available to buy from our online shop. Only a limited run.

Something we are getting asked to do more and more are limited edition letterpress prints. This wonderful illustration by Dutch artist Alice Kok was a delight to print. The flowing linework created a wonderful deep impression into the paper. Alice supplied her illustration via email and we suggested suitable papers. Saunders was perfect for these prints as it would allow a deep impression without the paper warping under the extreme pressures of the press.